<SPAN name="LEGAL_STATUS_OF_THE_JEWS" id="LEGAL_STATUS_OF_THE_JEWS"></SPAN>
<h3>CONCERNING THE LEGAL STATUS OF THE JEWS</h3>
<h4><span class="sc">By</span> COUNT IVAN TOLSTOY</h4>
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<p>"Therefore all things whatsoever ye would that men should do to you,
do ye even so to them." (St. Matthew, 7, 12.) This is the divine law,
which it is the task of every one who considers and feels himself a
Christian to follow, and which should also be strictly observed by a
State. Now, would any one of the Christians who owe their allegiance
to the Russian state consent to be treated as the Jews are in Russia?
Would he like to be confined within a certain definite zone of
settlement, to be kept from giving his children an education, and to
find himself excluded from many fields of honest and honourable
endeavour? Would he like, all through his life to be humiliated before
his co-citizens of other faith and birth?</p>
<p><span class="pagenum"><SPAN name="Page_160" id="Page_160">[160]</SPAN></span>You despise them, hate them, and accuse them of all that it may please
any maniac or liar to invent about them. Yet you demand of the Jews
that they should help you, when you stand in need of help. You,
Jew-haters, serve somebody or something, but truly it is not God, it
is not the cause of goodness that you are serving. In your blindness
you harm, above all, yourself and our country, our dear,
long-suffering Russia, whom the Jews, your co-citizens, love and
cannot help loving more than you do. They know that Russia hates none
of her faithful and loving children and that they are hated only by
people, who, either by nature or because of a poor education, cannot
exist without hating some one or something. By their deeds ye shall
know them, these wolves disguised as sheep.</p>
<p>Combat evil and side with good, do good, and do not judge a man by the
fact that his parents are Jewish or Christian, or that he was born
into one faith or another. Remember that we are all born equally naked
and that we must all die. Therefore, do not boast of your birth; bear
firmly in mind that we are all <span class="pagenum"><SPAN name="Page_161" id="Page_161">[161]</SPAN></span>equal before God, before Truth and
that we must be equal before the Law.</p>
<p>As for the legal disabilities of a portion of citizens who are guilty
of no crime,—such as injustice must be completely condemned. In
practice, such a policy has always borne and always will bear fruits
of evil. The very existence of such an injustice corrupts and puts in
jeopardy the social body which tolerates it.... No benefits which may
be derived by individual persons or social classes from an inequality
of rights can justify the State in depriving a group of citizens of
their full rights, as a result of their race and faith. This is the
A-B-C of justice, and those who do not know it have yet to learn what
justice is.</p>
<p>Neither are the Jews better than we are, nor are we better than they.
We are all human beings and, as such, we must all be equal before the
impartial and dispassionate Law, which determines our rights and
duties towards the State and society. Good and bad people, I repeat,
are everywhere, and the proportion is roughly the same among us as
<span class="pagenum"><SPAN name="Page_162" id="Page_162">[162]</SPAN></span>among them. Let us, therefore, strive for the realisation of justice
on earth, and let us believe in the final triumph of truth. The rest
will be added unto us. Without such a faith it is hard to live....</p>
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